Chapter 63: Greater Lord Rukkhadevata

After swallowing the Vijnana Fruit, Lin Feng closed his eyes and felt as though he were sinking into a deep, dark, lightless ocean.

In the endless void, he beheld a series of fantastical, distorted, and fragmented worlds.

There were flowing sandstones, howling fish, inverted forests hanging from the clouds, and a starry sky deeply buried beneath his feet.

—This seemed to be a dream, yet not a dream belonging solely to any single individual.

Such a massive anomaly caused Lin Feng to feel a long-absent sense of puzzlement.

In his original expectations, this period of deep sleep was primarily meant to elevate his true tier and raise his output ceiling.

To someone like him who was nearing godhood, the greatest effect of the Vijnana Fruit displayed on his interface would probably just be raising the level of his Dream Blessing and once again enhancing his affinity for dreams and nature.

—Although in the plot, this "Seed of Hope" constructed from memories and pleasant dreams easily repaired Rana’s foundation of life, its power still fell somewhat short of the divine tier.

Was it a problem with himself? Or did the Ashvattha Tree add something extra into it?

Bearing the faint throbbing pain in his head, Lin Feng tried to deduce the cause of this abnormal situation.

With no answers obtainable for the moment, he could only try to gather some information from his surrounding environment.

Looking around, Lin Feng made the following observations:

First, the overall space resembled the deep sea or the void.

There were many floating worlds within this space, the vast majority of which were devoid of human presence, consisting merely of chaotic, illogical arrangements of elements. Even in the worlds with people, the facial details of most "people" were heavily blurred, as if censored by the highest-level pixelation.

—From these characteristics, it could be largely determined that this void was none other than the sea of dreams that had appeared in Nahida's promotional video.

Second, he was able to move. Aside from the headache caused by initially failing to control his perception and taking in too much dream content all at once, there were no other adverse reactions.

—Very well, it did not seem to be a negative change either.

Lastly, calling out to Nahida yielded no response, nor could he perceive Nahida's dream space as he had in the past.

—He now seemed to be in a special state, rather than simply dreaming.

Because his body's instincts told him that his current state was not a bad thing; instead, there was a sense of fulfillment as if something was being "filled in."

Therefore, Lin Feng was not overly nervous. Instead, he began to explore the world around him.

Although Teyvat's Dendro element and dreams were originally two sides of the same coin, Lin Feng had previously leaned more toward developing powers on the side of "life," and had not delved much into "dreams," which could not provide immediate combat utility—of course, the absence of the dream authority was also part of the problem.

Nahida had once said something like this to the Traveler: "When blessed with Dendro elemental energy, one is simultaneously granted the Dendro element's attunement to the power of dreams."

It was precisely because of this that the Traveler was able to experience that strange sense of déjà vu during the Sabzeruz Festival.

Yet, looking across all holders of Dendro Visions, none had ever displayed special powers related to "dreams."

Therefore, merely possessing the Dendro element would most likely only grant some dream resistance, while the authority over dreams was still grasped solely by deities of the Greater Lord Rukkhadevata lineage.

Because Lin Feng had unconsciously devoured the dream energy brought by the Lesser Lord Kusanali previously, upon acquiring the trait "Blessing of Dreams," he could slightly influence the subconscious of others, achieving simple pacification or suggestion.

—But the feeling right now was entirely different. Suddenly, "dreams" transformed for Lin Feng from an illusory "concept" into an entity as tangible as a physical object, which he could move and interfere with at will.

Having suddenly gained such a novel experience, Lin Feng tried to guide a dream near him, wishing to test just how far this brand-new power could go.

—Merely with this thought, the chaotic world before him, resembling a Picasso painting, quickly reconfigured into a brightly lit classroom.

In the center of the classroom, a student with heavy dark circles under his eyes was being severely chewed out by a bearded old man. As the old man yelled, the environment around the student shifted slightly in response to his emotions.

It seemed this student was the owner of the dream.

Lin Feng merely wished to see the scene that had left the deepest impression on the dream's owner today, and the originally chaotic world swiftly became organized, reproducing the exact scene Lin Feng wished to witness.

Similar to memory retrieval? That could still prove somewhat useful.

Having experimented with his power, Lin Feng slightly increased the young man's courage to compensate him for the nightmare.

Ignoring the meaty sounds of punches landing from behind, the anonymous do-gooder left the current dream.

In the time that followed, Lin Feng wandered aimlessly.

Like a compilation of all human imagination, the wonder of dreams was far beyond what ordinary people could interpret.

After casually defeating a "giant man-eating mushroom monster" within a dream, Lin Feng felt a faint sensation that he was about to awaken from his long slumber.

Along with a sudden wave of dizziness, an unprecedentedly massive amount of information began flooding into his mind.

Were these the memories of the Ashvattha Tree and the Aranara?

Before he could ponder further, a surging torrent submerged Lin Feng's consciousness.

Carried along by the torrent, he seemed to briefly become the master of those memories, reliving past times from a first-person perspective.

—He saw pomegranates split open, seeds falling to the ground and transforming into bounding sprites.

—He saw the sky dyed red and the earth dyed black, giant trees collapsing and life withering away.

—He saw green light filling the heavens, ferocious beasts falling, and death receding.

—Finally, he saw a purple sky and a giant tree in full bloom with cherry-pink blossoms.

The overwhelming amount of information plunged Lin Feng's consciousness into a momentary blankness. Sinking like the deep sea of memories, he felt an indescribable, heavy sense of suffocation.

Right at that moment.

A small figure seemed to embrace the falling Lin Feng from behind.

The other's emerald-green hair tips lifted slightly with the movement, gently brushing across his face.

Amidst his bewilderment, Lin Feng seemed to hear her words.

The voice was clear, the tone gentle.

She said:

—"Once, I was the only individual in the world capable of dreaming."

—"In my dreams, everyone would also drift off to sleep once night fell."

—"I am the one who sets the proposition, and also the one who seeks the solution."

—"Now, my answer has been found, and my mission has been fulfilled."

—"Traveler from a foreign land, may you also find your own answer beneath this unfamiliar sky."

Accompanied by a gentle push, Lin Feng felt like a drowning person suddenly breaking the surface of the water; stimulated by the sunlight, he snapped his eyes open.

Just now, was that Nahida?

Lin Feng took a deep breath, recalling the voice he had heard right before waking, finding it exceptionally familiar.

Yet soon, he dismissed this answer.

—Nahida's tone and phrasing differed far too much from what he had just heard.

"Greater Lord Rukkhadevata?"

Lin Feng lifted his head slightly, gazing through the bright glass at the giant tree outside the window.

Recalling the connection between the Ashvattha Tree and Greater Lord Rukkhadevata, combined with the emerald-green hair and the purple sky he had faintly glimpsed earlier,

he arrived at a fairly clear deduction regarding the identity of the girl who had embraced him from behind.